


Not Rushing In

by Lire_Casander



Category: Hanson
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-05
Updated: 2013-09-05
Packaged: 2017-12-25 17:00:37
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,155
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/955554
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lire_Casander/pseuds/Lire_Casander





	Not Rushing In

__  
**2001**  


When the sun came up on March 14th, Zac Hanson didn't quite notice it from where he was staying. The basement of their family house was lit with dim lights, and there were no windows showing the exterior. Zac was virtually isolated from the rest of the world, only connected to his family by a steeply staircase.

His plan was working perfectly fine until he heard his mother's voice calling for him upstairs. He knew his time was short, and he tried to finish off what he had been doing all night, but it was to no avail.

"Zac, c'mon, come up here. Your brother's leaving."

He wiped his forehead, fully aware that he had no more spare minutes to try and end what he had started. He cast one last longing look at his masterpiece before dragging a white sheet, nearly grey due to its hiding place on a box at the basement, and covering with it the surprise he had put all his efforts on those last weeks. It didn't matter anymore.

On his 18th birthday, Taylor Hanson was leaving his own family.

Zac walked up the stairs feeling the defeat crawling up his veins, like a disease, like his blood was tainted. When he reached the top, his fingers searched for the switch and in a swift movement he flicked it.

In a nanosecond, the lights went out and all was covered in darkness.

_**2011** _

He watched the ruins where his house had once stood, and shook his head. After three years of spending his life there, a fire started in a forest nearby had detsroyed the life he had known.

"Where are you going now, Zachary?" said a warm voice behind him. "I mean, there's nothing you can rescue there. It's all ruined."

He turned around and saw Mrs Littlely, his neighbour, and her children standing next to him. They had been the only family he had had for a while, and it was only normal they cared about him.

"I guess I'll go back home now. Back to Oklahoma," he whispered, pursing his lips. "I don't really want to, but there's nothing left for me here and I think it might be time for a change, for coming back to my roots."

Mrs Littlely nodded. "I think it's a good idea. You've been spending far too much time here since the fire, son."

"I may have, Mrs Littlely, but it has been my only home for some time."

"Ours too, Zachary, but it's been a month and you're still camping outside the ruins and sleeping under a tent in what's left of your garden. I know it's hard to let go, but the world doesn't end in Houston, Texas. Go back home, put at rest all of your ghosts, and decide whether it is useful to keep running away."

Zac blinked, blushing furiously. Mrs Littlely was the only person he had trusted enough to tell her about his past - about his secret sitting on his parents' basement, about his brother leaving on his quest to forget about their parents' insensibility, of his inability to remain there once Taylor had gone. She was the only one to understand, and now she was urging him to go back home.

"I don't know if I'm ready, though," he tried to argue.

"I've found a small house, enough for my children and me, downtown. You'll always have one room for you, should you choose to come back to Texas."

Zac smiled gratefully at the woman who had become a substitute of his own mother, whom he blamed for Taylor's leaving. "I know, Mrs. Littlely, I know, and I thank you for this." Once he had made his decision, he knew there was no way back.

Nine hours later, he was on a plane, praying that his coming back to Tulsa would not stir too many hurtful feelings.

*-*-*-*-*-*

The house looked exactly like it had looked when he turned his head before getting away - just for a last glimpse of what he was leaving behind. It had been almost eight years ago, when he had stepped out of the Hanson household to head towards the public university of Houston, where he had studied.

It was the first time he was before the building since he left, and it was like being almost eighteen again.

There were five cars outside the house, and Zac counted them up mentally - Walker's, Diana's, probably Zoe's, and his best bet was Avery's. Jessica, for all he knew, had a job in New York for a fashion designer, and Isaac had left the family once he married his long-term girlfriend, Nikky, nine years before. So the fifth car was a guess he had to make - he decided it was Isaac's, since it looked like a big van designed for a family with kids.

His family knew he was coming, they had all known since they'd heard of the fire in the Houston area, even though they had not received a call from him in a long time. He could hear children's voices inside the house as he approached in his rented car - he didn't want to stay in that house longer than necessary. He was planning on leaving as soon as he got a job again - the one he had in Texas had burnt down in the fire.

The door opened before he could ever knock on it.

"Zac!" exclaimed a young blond girl, her eyes as blue as Taylor's, holding the door. "Mom, Zac's here!"

It seemed like something had exploded inside the building. Not only did he hear kid's voices, but his mother's and his father's, and a voice he did not recognize. "Zac! C'mere, we're in the kitchen!" The girl, who he knew to be Zoe, leaded the way back to the kitchen where he had spent so many mornings with Taylor. His parents and a woman he hadn't met before were working on what looked like a big apple pie.

The smell of it brought him memories of endless nights when Tay and he waltzed into the kitchen searching for a midnight snack.

The greetings, the hugs, the words of love and the laughters fell into deaf ears - he wasn't really listening. All he cared about was for going to his old bedroom, the one he shared with Taylor, and get drown in memories. He knew why his mother had been backing apple pie, he would have to be born again to forget the date.

Taylor's birthday.

Ever since they had bid farewell to him, ten years before, the Hanson family had always celebrated Taylor's day with apple pie, his favorite, and that had made Zac sick for two whole years before gathering up the courage to fly away. They were a bunch of hypocrites, pretending Taylor had left on his own and not because they had kicked him out for being different. For being someone they didn't approve of.

Zac stood in the middle of the corridor - at his right, the stairs leading to his room; at his left, the door heading towards the basement where he once hid his biggest secret, the surprise he had prepared for Taylor. Without really realizing it, he moved to his left, he who was left-handed, and opened the door.

The dust covered everything, the boxes piled on the ground and the old sheets concealing an old piano that hadn't been played in then years. Zac smiled, brushing his finger past the keys, remembering the gift he had been about to give Taylor.

He sat on the bench, unaware of the sudden commotion above his head in the kitchen, and pressed some dusty keys. A melody swayed in the air and he let himself get lost in the music that one day had been his only future, long before life slapped them in the face forcing them to go back to reality.

After a few seconds he gave up, resting his head on the keyboard, and muttering "Happy birthday, Taylor."

"Oh, thank you very much, Zac," said a voice he would have recognized anywhere. His head snapped up and he turned around so fast he almost fell off his seat.

"Taylor!" he exclaimed. "You're here! You're _really_ here!"

"Erm, yeah, I guess so," his older brother replied, comically checking his own body. "How're you doing?"

Zac was at a loss of words- Taylor Hanson, the brother he had lost ten years before due to his choices, was right before him - alive, shining and beautiful. His eyes took in that figure and acted on their own.

He started to cry.

Taylor's arms were around him before he could even start to tremble under his own sobs. "Shhh," he cooed. "I'm here. Don't cry, little bro, I'm really here. I'm not going anywhere this time."

They remained linked, Zac's head in Taylor's chest, their heartbeats punding hard in their chests. Life was calm for a whole three minutes, before Zac spoke aloud. "Why have you come back today, Tay? They kicked you out ten years ago, today."

He could hear his brother breathing in. "You are here at last. That's my reason. I heard you'd be back and I wanted to see you once more, before..."

"Before what?" Zac piped up when Taylor trailed off. "Tay?"

The blond smiled weakly and sighed. "I guess it's the moment, isn't it?"

"The moment?" Zac was dumbfounded. "I don't understand."

"It's the moment to tell you the truth about why I left and why I'm not coming back ever again." He seemed to expect something from Zac's lips, and when he thought nothing was going to be said, he opened his mouth only to be cut by his brother.

"They kicked you because you are gay."

The force in those words nearly knocked Taylor off his feet. They were still hugging, quite awkwardly, and Zac could feel every breath his brother took in. "That's only half of the truth, Zac," Taylor cleared his throat. "It's been ten years, it can only make you get farther from me, so I'm telling you... They kicked me out 'cause I am gay and I loved... _you_. They thought I'd get over it with time, but it's not a disease, you can't recover from it..."

"I know you loved me," Zac interrupted. "Did they think you'd turn me gay too?"

"No, Zac, you don't understand. I _loved_ you. God, I still love you. They were ashamed of me."

"I don't quite understand... It can't be..." Zac swallowed hard. He remembered the feeling of void and loneliness when he knew Taylor was leaving the house, how he thought life would never be the same, the love he put into that surprise for _weeks_... "You can't love me, not in that way."

"I knew I shouldn't have said a thing, yet I had to," Taylor admonised himself, disentangling himself from his brother. "Sorry to have bothered you, and sorry for coming back without warning..."

"Don't. Go." Zac found it difficult to breathe. "Please, don't go. I... it's... well, I still can't believe it. But... I can't find the proper words... please stay..."

Taylor was halfway to the stairs when Zac sat on the bench and started to play a soft tune of an unknown melody that filled the air and went right through his soul.

_Like the sun needs the moon to raise up each day,_  
 _I need you to light up the darkness in my life,_  
 _to help me believe in what I want to say -_  
 _"Thank you for always being my smile."_  
 _Like the stars shine through the darkest night,_  
 _you are the brightness in a clouded room,_  
 _the person for whom I will forever fight._  
 _I'll tell you I love you, someday soon._

 

"We're grown-ups now, Tay," Zac said, smiling softly. "That's why I fled so many years ago, too."

"I don't understand."

"This was my present for your eighteenth birthday, Taylor. But I didn't have time to show you, and I always wondered what you'd think of it, what you'd think of me, feeling this way about my own brother."

Taylor moved back to Zac, sat down besides him on the bench and sighed. "So," tried Zac, "what do you think?"

"Well," the older smiled back. "I take it you don't have a house, and you won't stay here long. I don't have any spare room in my apartment in New York City, so if you don't mind sharing..." 

"Are you asking me to go to New York with you?"

"Yeah. Move in with me, Zac, and let me make up for all these years."

The reply was lost forever when Zac leant in and kissed Taylor full on the lips, silencing him, feeling him. He didn't care about the crisis that would more than probably trigger their kiss, for all that mattered was the pair of lips sealing a deal that could last an eternity.


End file.
